A Chance to Elope?
4.15 Looks like it’s going to be a long morning. Worry has obviously decided it is time we all get up and moving. She then thinks better of it and falls back into a luxurious sleep, leaving me wide awake after all her noisy prowling around and knocking something off the window sill which was what finally brought me properly to my senses. I only decide to throttle her for a fleeting moment.
8.30 Actually it is nice to be up early and there is blue sky which is always welcome and I need to get a birthday card in the post for the nine o clock collection. It is for my niece in law? Well at any rate the wife of my nephew. They are a very modern thinking couple (even that phrase sounds old fashioned now) but you know what I mean and I imagine for equality of the sexes sake, they decided to take both of their surnames into a double
barrelled married name. This reminds me of a story about a doctor I used to work for years ago. A local woman came into his surgery, shall we say of limited means (if we are allowed to say that now). She sat down opposite him (as they did in those days when doctors looked at you instead of the computer screen) and the doctor’s first question was ‘Why do you have a double-barrelled surname?” The woman stuttered over the fact that they had just decided to put their names together. The reply from the doctor: ‘Well double barrelled names are only for the great and the good, not for the likes of you’.
The thought of anyone being so pompous and rude now is enough to make you shudder and could have got him into all sorts of trouble I would imagine.
One other thought on the subject; it occurs to me is that if married couples are going to take on both of their surnames, what will happen when their children marry? e.g Rowbottom-Brown marrying Falsworthy-Green and then their children ending up with eight connected surnames and so on.
My phones have been dead for several days now and after my reporting it the other day, a man from Open Reach appears on my drive. He tells me that he should be able to fix the problem from outside as they are not allowed into peoples houses unless absolutely necessary which suits me fine of course. As we leave for our walk, he leans a ladder up against the front of the house in order to inspect some box or other.
11.15 It is a perfect day for walking so we extend our walk in the woods a bit but there are sheep in one of the fields we would normally cross, they look a little nervous at our approach so we take a detour which means a bit of road walking, good for dog claws.
When we get back from the walk, there is no sign of the man or his van but the ladder is still propped against the wall.
14.20 Ladder still propped up, van still gone, no explanation and now not only are my phones not working but nor is the Wifi. Let’s hope he doesn’t leave the ladder there all night, people might think I am hoping for some chap to elope with!
17.30 The fault is fixed, the poor engineer is looking very soggy from the rain, apparently there was a crossed wire in the box down the road, I have had a lot of crossed wires over the years, perhaps I could have fixed it!